


Victories

by Morninglight (orphan_account)



Series: Commander and Commanded [3]
Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Cunnilingus, Dom/sub, F/M, Rimming, Rope Bondage, Vaginal Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-27 05:50:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6272368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Morninglight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The war is won and the victor celebrates with the one who, in surrendering everything, asks for everything in return.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Victories

**Author's Note:**

> Note: Thanks for reading and reviewing. Trigger warnings for death (including a minor), violence, dehumanisation, mentions of postpartum depression and fantastic racism. Third and last in the Commander and Commanded series; rope bondage, rimming and loads of head-canon involved.

 The battle plan worked beyond Arthur’s dreams, Liberty Prime scything through the Institute’s ceiling like a ripper through Brahmin butter. It was time for the ground forces to take control of the situation and win them the path to the fusion reactor. It was time to write his name in the Brotherhood’s history books and save the world from a group of fools.

            “Hello?” Arthur hauled Final Judgment around to kill a Gen-1 synth but as his battlecoat deflected a laser blast, he realised that there were three of them and the other soldiers were momentarily distracted by the sudden surge of skeletal synths.

            _No!_ He would not die on the eve of the Brotherhood’s greatest victory since the Battle of Broken Steel at Adams Air Force Base. Final Judgment wiped out one but the other two were closing in-

            And Sparrow threw a fragmentation grenade and yelled “Fire in the hole!” as it detonated, turning the two synths into shredded plastic and metal.

            Though the Director of the Institute being her son was classified information, everyone knew that she’d been the only one to infiltrate the facility and survive, so that was ample explanation for her presence in Arthur’s team. Because she’d borne her shaming without a hint of cracking, Sparrow had regained some of the respect she’d lost after failing to kill Danse, and most of the rank and file accepted it was she’d been put in the wrong caste. Now she was a Scribe in Logistics, the woman seemed happier, and the Brotherhood would forgive if she helped bring them victory.

            “Father’s no fool,” she said after the scuffle was done. “He’ll have locked off Advanced Systems and linked it to his personal chambers.”

            Arthur nodded tightly. “Brandis, Rhys! Secure the centre of the facility. Team Alpha will be going to the Director’s quarters.”

            His two Star Paladins saluted and for a brief irrational moment, Arthur missed Danse. Then he shook his head and reloaded a new fusion core into Final Judgment.

            When they broke into the centre of the facility, Arthur stared in awe at the greenery. Sparrow said that the trees and grass used to be green – bright vivid emerald-green, like mirelurk blood – before the bombs fell.

            “They had all this and wouldn’t share it with the Commonwealth,” Brandis observed in bitter awe. “Bastards.”

            “Get the Field Scribes to run network scans on a Biosciences terminal,” Sparrow said crisply. “I know for a fact they have genetically modified seeds that would make a big difference to our settlements and their ability to provision us.”

            When Brandis looked to Arthur for confirmation, he nodded. Quinlan would destroy everything but it would be better to go through the knowledge of the Institute with a fine-toothed comb and save what was worth saving.

            Even with the three Coursers who reinforced synth guards, the Star Paladins laid waste to the enemy by strategic use of mini nukes launched by Fat Man catapults. Sparrow made a small choked noise and worried, Arthur looked over his shoulder at her.

            “I was reminded of watching the bomb fall, the nuclear wind flattening the trees and ruffling my hair as we descended into the Vault,” she said hoarsely. “I can function, Elder.”

            “When this is over, I’d like you to record your story for the archives,” he commanded gently. “It will be a valuable addition to the histories.”

            “Yes, Elder,” she murmured, looking down.

            When they returned to the Prydwen, he was going to fuck her senseless. With the last week of preparations, he hadn’t gotten the chance to touch her, to bind and mark her as his.

            “Alright, push on,” he ordered, taking point with Sparrow at his side, leading them to a spiral ramp.

            In contrast to the war-torn exterior, Father’s quarters were sterile and clean, everything precisely placed. “Nate was like this too,” Sparrow murmured. “Everything had its place. It was his way of coping with the trauma of war.”

            “Guard the doors,” he ordered Knight-Captain Cora, who saluted. The other soldiers took their posts, leaving Sparrow and Arthur to advance on the Director of the Institute on their own.

            Shaun Finlay, Sparrow’s son, was tall and spare-boned with a still-handsome face. Green-hazel eyes glittered with impotent rage and grief as he lay on his deathbed, surrounded by medical equipment, and in the arch of his eyebrows and the few remaining strands of chestnut in his grey hair, Arthur saw Sparrow. Everything else was apparently Nate’s.

            “Here to finish the job?” he demanded in a resonant voice. “It doesn’t matter. The cancer’s done most of the work.”

            “Shaun-“ Sparrow’s voice cracked and failed when that scornful gaze was turned on her.

            “Don’t bother, _Mother_.” The last word was uttered with total contempt and loathing. “You’ve doomed us all.”

            Sparrow quailed as if struck – then her jaw set and she squared her shoulders. “No, Shaun. I’ve saved us all. The Scribes will preserve the medical and agricultural knowledge. The Institute could have done so much good, but you chose to squander and selfishly hoard everything you knew.”

            “And so you bring merciless murderers to finish me off. You don’t even have the decency to kill me yourself.”

            The contempt in the Director’s tone was enough to make Arthur speak. “No, Finlay. I won’t execute you. A bullet would be too kind after everything you’ve done.”

            “That’s right. M7-97 became a Paladin.” The Director looked almost amused.

            “And I executed it myself. It died with more dignity than you ever lived with,” Arthur retorted, compelled to give Danse that much tribute. “Scribe, check the terminal. I want the way to Advanced Systems open.”

            “Yes, Elder Maxson.” Sparrow gave Shaun a final sorrowful glance before obeying. “Goodbye, Shaun.”

            “Go and leave me to my death. You’ve destroyed us all.”

            At the stricken look on Sparrow’s face, Arthur almost reconsidered his decision not to shoot Finlay, but instead he turned away and followed Sparrow into the office.

            She used a network scan and then typed in the commands to remove the lock on the Advanced Systems. He saw the green highlight line pause on the evacuation order… then move down to the lock commands. Arthur leaned over and brushed the back of her neck with his lips, offering comfort and support. He knew there were children here but for the sake of the Brotherhood’s future children, the Institute needed to be destroyed, root and branch.

            She pressed the button and then straightened, her back flush to his chest, taking strength from his strength. That was how they worked, Arthur realised as he briefly embraced her – in surrendering everything to him, Sparrow asked for everything in return. Not demanded – it wasn’t her way – but asked.

            He would give it to her.

            They had to leave by Shaun’s bedroom and when Arthur looked in the man’s direction, he saw the Director’s face turned away. When Sparrow went to approach him, Arthur grabbed her shoulder and shook his head. There would be no deathbed forgiveness for her from her son.

            Sparrow lowered her head and walked out ahead of him.

            It was a bitter battle to reach the fusion reactor. Despite losing the Beryllium agitator, the Institute had managed to get their reactor up and running. Sparrow made a choked sound. “If they’d just shared this with the world…”

            He already knew that Ingram would have copied the design. The Brotherhood’s Scribes would see if it could be copied safely and applied to their power needs.

            But it was time to add the charges and move.

            When they reached Ingram at the console, there was a boy there – lanky, huge-eyed, chestnut-haired. “There you are,” Proctor Ingram said, sounding relieved as Alpha, Gladius and Artemis joined the Scribes. “Everyone else is out but…”

            “Mother?” The boy looked up at Sparrow hopefully. “Have you come to save me?”

            “It’s the synth that was used as bait for me,” Sparrow said hoarsely.

            “I’m not a synth! I’m your son!”

            _“YOU’RE NOT MY SON!”_ Sparrow screamed at it.

            Even Arthur’s heart twisted at the look on the child-synth’s face. But if he could execute his best friend for unknowingly being a synth, he could leave a weapon that had been deliberately created to hurt Sparrow behind. “Take us out, Ingram. That’s the child-synth the Institute used to lure Sparrow to them.”

            “Those sick bastards,” Ingram said hoarsely as she pressed the buttons to get them all out.

            The world turned into blue-white light and as they emerged on the rooftop of the Mass Fusion building, the detonator already in place, Arthur had just enough warning to lean over as he vomited from the vertigo. He wasn’t the only one.

            When they collected themselves, wiping mouths and hawking to get the sour taste of bile out of their mouths, Arthur noticed Brandis and Rhys giving Sparrow sympathetic looks. Word would spread of what the Institute had done to her… and understanding would follow in its wake.

            “Do you-?” he asked Sparrow, only to see her shake her head.

            “No. Even though that’s not Shaun…” She shuddered.

            Arthur didn’t bother wasting time with ceremony. He lifted the plastic cover and pressed the red button down hard.

            And like that, the Institute was destroyed, root and branch.

…

Even in the wake of victory, there was work to be done, and Sparrow threw herself into it so she could distract herself from the last haunting image of the Shaun-synth’s face as they left him there to die.

            It had to be done. But it didn’t stop Sparrow’s heart from being one raw exposed nerve.

            Arthur had Teagan release double alcohol and luxury food rations for everyone on the Prydwen, staggering the celebratory feast across all three shifts so that a full guard could be maintained at all times, and Sparrow offered to take the Proctor’s turn in the cage so that he could go have a bit of fun himself. Two shifts (sixteen hours) of sitting in the armoury and dispensing rations as needed.

            Haylen, now assigned to botany on the Prydwen, stopped by and asked, “Why are you still punishing yourself over Danse?”

            “I’m not,” Sparrow answered, handing over a box of Dandy Apples. “My son… a copy of my son… died there. Better to work than get drunk and cry.”

            “Oh.” Haylen looked down. She had a lovely fall of ginger hair when not wearing her Scribe’s cap. “If you need to talk…”

            “It’s okay,” Sparrow assured her fellow Scribe. “Go see if you can sweet-talk Rhys out of his power armour before someone else gets the idea.”

            Haylen chuckled. “He’s not getting away that easily. Ad Victoriam, Sparrow. We wouldn’t have won without you.”

            “Ad Victoriam, Haylen.” Sparrow saluted and ignored the shadows in the Scribe’s eyes. She still mourned Danse and didn’t dare say anything.

            She served a few more soldiers before Proctor Ingram arrived. “Well, you’re a sight prettier than the usual one behind these bars,” the slightly tipsy officer joked. “Teagan’s swearing he’s going to marry you just so he can have a few days off.”

            “I’m happy to swap shifts with the Proctor but no way I’m marrying him,” Sparrow answered. “How are you?”

            “Good.” Ingram ran a hand through her tousled red hair. “Listen, could you put down a note for the Scribes? We need special coolant for the Prydwen and…”

            “And now the Institute’s done for, we need to resupply,” Sparrow finished, grabbing pen and paper. “What do you need?”

            Ingram recited a list and Sparrow wrote them down. After that, the Proctor accepted a bottle of vodka and looked at the Scribe penetratingly. “You know, you’re true Steel,” she said quietly. “You don’t need to beat yourself up over everything, not when you’ve proven yourself in the role you should have been placed into from the first. We don’t blame the axle for not cutting up enemies like a sword.”

            Sparrow blinked back the tears. “Thanks.”

            “Grieve if you have to but don’t forget to celebrate. The bastards who ruined your life are dead and buried.” Ingram smiled, reached through the cage to pat Sparrow on the shoulder, and headed off just as a sour-faced Teagan arrived.

            “Time to relieve you,” the Proctor announced. “Just when I was enjoying my freedom.”

            Sparrow pressed the button and the door clicked open. She hadn’t minded being in here, though she could see why day after day would be tiresome. “I’ll see if I can cover for you more often, Teagan. If we can rope in a third person – maybe Gavel from Logistics – we could have a person for each shift and still have healthy amounts of time outside of the cage.”

            “Not a bad idea,” Teagan said, swigging from his bottle of whiskey. “Maxson wants to see you. Something about a promotion.”

            Sparrow nodded. “Got it.”

            She dodged the man’s hug as she left the cage. “Ad Victoriam, Proctor,” she said, saluting him.

            Teagan grimaced, taking the hint. He went inside, shut the cage, and sat down at the desk.

            It took a couple questions of semi-drunk soldiers (and a few back slaps and commiserations) to discover where Arthur was: brooding in the viewport.

            “Elder?” Sparrow asked tentatively, wondering which side of him she’d be dealing with today. Elder Maxson led the Brotherhood with a linear clarity and cold gaze, deploying his soldiers like the weapons they were. Arthur, on the other hand, was passionately possessive about what he deemed his – the Brotherhood, the Prydwen… and her.

            “I’m promoting you to Senior Scribe,” he said over his shoulder. “Permanently assigned to procurement for the Prydwen.”

            “Proctor Teagan will like that,” Sparrow observed. “If you throw in someone from Logistics to work in the cage, all three of us could work a shift in there, a shift outside, and still have enough time for rest and a bit of recreation.”

            “Gavel,” Arthur immediately decided. “He’s the only one of an appropriate rank who can be trusted.”

            “Great minds think alike,” Sparrow murmured.

            “Indeed.” The Elder turned around and looked at her pointedly. Sparrow noted that he was knotting a bit of orange and black nylon rope in his hands. “So, the war is won, though we still have a lot of clean up to do. What do you want from the Brotherhood?”

            “I’m… content,” Sparrow answered, surprising herself with the truth. “My old life is gone, dead as can be. The Brotherhood’s given me a new one.”

            “Are you happy?” It was Arthur speaking now.

            “It’ll take me some time, but I think I’ll get there,” she told him honestly.

            His large hands tightened on the rope. Sparrow looked up at him, the heavy line of his brows, the searing gas-flame blue of his eyes, the grim twist of his lips, and went over to touch his scarred cheek.

            Something relaxed in him at her touch. “What was taken from you, I would return,” he rasped. “You’ve given me your total surrender… and in return, asked for everything.”

            “I’d be yours, if I can,” Sparrow answered. She knew enough about the political dynamics to understand that he might have to marry for advantage, not for love.

            “You can be,” he said roughly. “I’ve been confirmed as High Elder of the Brotherhood of Steel.”

            Sparrow smiled at him. “That’s good news for you.”

            “Indeed. I intend to name an Elder for the Commonwealth Chapter. I rule the Capital Chapter directly.” For a moment, bitterness flickered across his face. “I would have named Danse, but I am left with a choice of Brandis and Rhys with one as Elder, the other as my Sentinel.”

            Sparrow pursed her lips. “Brandis would make the better Elder. Rhys… is a good attack dog but he needs a hand on the leash.”

            Arthur’s smile was sour. “Again, you speak my mind. I don’t think anyone’s going to object to you being my Consort – sanctioned permanent lover. I would make you Lady Maxson but…”

            “The politics. I understand, Arthur.” Sparrow caressed his cheek again. “I’ve been married once. It’s… not what it’s cracked up to be. I miss Nate but…”

            “But?”

            “We would have broken up eventually. We were both too fragile and he hated making most of the decisions because I was a wreck.” Sparrow hung her head. “I prefer someone else to make the hard decisions, especially when they need to be made.”

            “You have nothing to apologise for,” Arthur said quietly. “I… need a reason beyond honour, glory and my sacred bloodline to pursue my duties. You are that reason.”

            His eyes burned and Sparrow shuddered, feeling a twist of arousal in her belly. “I hope you value me at least as much as Final Judgment,” she quipped.

            “Final Judgment is a tool. The Prydwen is the culmination of a decade’s vision and labour,” Arthur rasped. “You are mine, the only thing I can call my own without the Brotherhood having a prior claim on it. That is why you will be my Consort.”

            She followed the movements of his fingers and saw that he’d twisted the rope into a set of loose cuffs with a loop at the end that would tighten the nylon around her wrists. Silently, she held out her hands and he slipped them on, tightening the rope until it was snug but not uncomfortable.

            For her, at least, it had never been about pain. It was about surrender, belonging to someone because she was her and not because of her bloodline or a sense of duty. If she’d understood this about herself in the pre-War days, she and Nate might have been the happier for it.

            Arthur led her to his quarters as the sounds of moans and cries of pleasure drifted from the barracks. “The three days following a victory is considered an excellent time to conceive future members of the Brotherhood,” he noted with a gleam in his eye. “Cade will be busy in nine months or so. Thankfully, we’ll have returned to the Citadel by then and have a number of trained birth attendants to hand.”

            Sparrow’s womb clenched. Shaun was dead, lost in nuclear annihilation. Was she ready to bear another child?

            “Arthur…” She swallowed thickly and began to talk. “After Shaun’s birth, I suffered from something called postpartum depression. Nate was in a warzone, my mother had been called to Washington – the Capital Wasteland – and I didn’t have any friends to support me. I was a wreck because I couldn’t cope and a woman’s body changes during pregnancy and birth. It took Nate returning and us getting Codsworth to help me get things together again… I… don’t know if I’ll suffer it again.”

            “I know what postpartum depression is,” Arthur said slowly. “If you aren’t up to a pregnancy at the moment, I… understand. You may be mine, but it’s by your choice.”

            “I’ll let God – the Creator – decide,” she replied. “I… just ask that you don’t leave me alone.”

            “You won’t be alone, though I understand what you mean.” Arthur rested his forehead against hers and sighed. “I won’t you let you face a birthing alone. Birthing is as much a battle as a twenty-hour firefight and I wouldn’t abandon a soldier to face that alone unless there was no choice.”

            “Shaun took two days,” Sparrow murmured.

            Arthur sucked in a breath and Sparrow recalled that he’d lost his mother young, then was raised by an Elder and his warrior daughter who probably didn’t have time to explain things like that to him.

            “I’ll bring your Mr Handy aboard,” he decided. “Codsworth will be useful and an Elder’s Consort has at least one aide. That should make some things easy for you.”

            Sparrow blinked back the tears. “Thank you,” she said softly. “He’s programmed to handle complex care scenarios. If I hadn’t come from money on my mother’s side, we would never have been able to afford him.”

            Arthur nodded before opening the door and tugging her into his quarters. Sparrow hissed in surprise at seeing the hook attached to the bedhead and two on the foot-railings. Then she saw he’d added extra comfortable pillows and coiled some more rope on the bed.

            She shuddered again and imagined herself, on back or belly, spreadeagled on that bed at Arthur’s tender mercies. The quiet moan that came from her mouth at the twist of longing in her belly surprised her and made Arthur suck in his breath again.

            “Back or belly?” he rasped.

            She thought of the decisions he’d saved her from over the past two days. “Your choice.”

            Unsurprisingly, she wound up on her stomach, forehead resting on a pillow with another under her hips to lift her ass into the air. Arthur looped the rope cuffs through the hook with a smaller piece of rope and then bent her knees to make her comfortable before tying her ankles to the hooks. Then he cut off her uniform gently, using a switchblade produced from somewhere. If he’d used the combat knife he kept in his boot, something would have broken inside her.

            Sparrow was already wet. She didn’t know where this had come from, this need to be at Arthur’s command as more than a soldier, but as his finger slid along her slit and made her produce a hungry moan, she welcomed it.

            “Soon, I will spend an entire day learning your body,” he vowed hoarsely as the finger was removed. “When I can take the leisure to do so.”

            “I think I’d die of pleasure,” Sparrow noted wryly, hearing zips and the rustle of leather.

            Arthur hung his battlecoat on his chair and chuckled. “Your faith in my abilities is touching, Sparrow, but perhaps a little misplaced.”

            “You’ve got me tied, ass up and legs spread, in your bedroom,” she pointed out. “I have absolute faith and trust in you, Arthur.”

            His response was to remove his uniform and then lower his mouth to her cunt, fingers roughly seeking out her clit. He licked, slow and long, along her slit and swirled his tongue around her puckered hole. The sensation was startling but pleasurable and she wriggled her hips enthusiastically.

            “One day,” he promised, kissing a buttock.

            “Lubricant,” she gasped. “You’ll need it. Cooking oil or antibacterial gel or something like that.”

            “Understood. I imagine Cade has something for those purposes.” Arthur reached for the can of purified water and swallowed a bit, swishing the water around in his mouth, before returning to eat her out until her mind blanked out and white noise roared in her ears.

            When he sheathed himself in the shuddering aftermath, Sparrow cried out his name in between pleas to a benevolent God for this gift that had been given her.

…

Watching Sparrow fall apart under lips, tongue and fingers was always a beautiful thing. He’d dared to taste her ass and discovered that there, she had experience too, thank the Eternal Steel.

            Arthur regretted that he couldn’t make Sparrow Lady Maxson, but that job required a certain amount of leadership that she couldn’t cope with. Besides, the open post could be dangled like a carrot in front of the other Elders whenever Arthur needed to manipulate them. His heir, at least, would be Sparrow’s. All of his children would be, given his preferences.

            His hands tightened on her hips as he thrust deeply, eagerly seeking his climax. He wanted a child from this night, conceived in the wake of victory, confirmed as the High Elder’s heir. Sparrow wouldn’t face this birthing alone. She deserved that much from him.

            Even bound, the pre-War survivor humped back on his cock, moaning his name like a prayer. As always, he fingered her clit, tending to her pleasure as she deserved. Arthur was rough and possessive – tendencies he’d felt guilty about – but he had no wish to cause her pain.

            He climaxed a moment before she did, spilling his seed deep into her with a hoarse cry, managing to choke back “Ad Victoriam.” Sparrow would have every right to kill him if he did that.

            Even if this was his way of celebrating his victory.

            When he was done, he unhooked Sparrow’s rope-cuffed hands from the bedhead hook and massaged her shoulders while remaining buried in her. No one would notice them for a few hours and he wanted… he wanted to fuck her again, fuck her until they were both exhausted.

            “You’re a dear,” she murmured as he massaged her neck. “I love you.”

            “And I love you,” he whispered. “I keep and protect what I love.”

            And he did, for the rest of his days and hers.

           

           


End file.
